


Start Where You Begin

by skoosiepants



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-30
Updated: 2009-11-30
Packaged: 2017-11-11 21:18:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/482992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skoosiepants/pseuds/skoosiepants
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was brilliant, as close to all-knowing as a human could possibly be, and he was slowly being whittled down to a drooling half-wit by a big-eyed, eerily silent three-year-old, the smallest baby known to mankind, and a black and white rabbit that ate absolutely everything that happened to be on floor level, including tape, electrical wiring, carpet fibers, wood molding, and socks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Start Where You Begin

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote the bulk of this fic THREE YEARS AGO, before Jeannie’s kid was ever named, which means that this story is both ridiculous and pointless, and since my writing style has evolved over the years, it’s probably a little disjointed as well. This is domestic fluff and schmoop, with a heavy dose of Rodney-ranting, and it’s mainly about being a dad. I’m leaning towards it being more of a character piece than even having a driving plot. So, WHATEVER, folks who are still interested in reading my SGA fic, enjoy—whatever this is.

If Rodney’s sister hadn’t already been dead, he would’ve killed her. Which was in poor, very bad taste, of course, but he honestly couldn’t handle the pressure, and it’d only been three days.   
  
He was brilliant, as close to all-knowing as a human could possibly be, and he was slowly being whittled down to a drooling half-wit by a big-eyed, eerily silent three-year-old, the smallest baby known to mankind, and a black and white rabbit that ate absolutely everything that happened to be on floor level, including tape, electrical wiring, carpet fibers, wood molding, and socks.  
  
“Okay, please, _please_ , for the love of all that’s holy, stop crying,” he begged, jostling tiny Tiffany – _oh my god, why, Jeannie?_ Tiffany? - and his voice was hoarse enough to make himself wince. His head felt like it was split in two, and George just looked up at him from his matchbox cars with those big, sad eyes, and Rodney thought he was going to snap.   
  
He couldn’t do it. He wasn’t dad material. He didn’t know the first thing about raising kids, and god knew he’d never really been one himself. Jeannie had to have been completely insane to name him guardian in her will, and didn’t Caleb have any family? Aunt, uncle, distant cousin?  
  
The knock on the door was both a surprise and a goddamn blessing, and he jumped for it, jerking it open without bothering to see who it was, hoping it was Cadman or even anyone with _hands_ \- and it was Dex, the large, hairy, two-handed man who lived in the attached house next door. The most important thing, though, was that Dex was an _adult_. He actually _spoke a language_. Granted, it was a gruff language liberally peppered with grunts and snorts, but Rodney wasn’t going to be picky.  
  
“You know what time it is, McKay?” Dex asked, crossing his arms over his chest, and Rodney ignored the warning couched in his tone, shoving Tiffany at him. Dex’s eyes flew wide and he grabbed for the wailing seven-month-old as Rodney let her go.  
  
“I love you,” Rodney said earnestly. He was aware he wasn’t exactly in his right mind. He didn’t care.  
  
A smile almost played around Dex’s mouth. “That’s nice.”  
  
“Yes, yes, it’s wonderful, you’re wonderful, now hold her forever, okay?” he said, voice tinged with desperation.   
  
“Do you know what time it is?” Dex asked again, and since Rodney was almost ninety-five percent sure he wasn’t actually asking for the time – it was hard to tell how Dex’s mind worked, but a watch glinted on his wrist - he figured it was late.  
  
Rodney nodded. “Hold her.” He jabbed a finger at him. “I’ll put George to bed.” A glance at the clock proved that it was past ten, so not late-late, but he was pretty sure George should’ve been in bed by seven – that seemed like a reasonable three-year-old bedtime to him, but, then again, what the hell did he know? – and that Tiffany, well. Babies probably screamed at all hours of the night. He was never going to sleep again.  
  
Rodney swung George up into his arms with a groan – his back was _never_ going to be the same – and trudged up the stairs and down the short hall. The second bedroom was small, but George’s little trundle bed still looked ridiculously tiny, pushed up against the wall under the single window, his tattered stuffed monkey perched on the pillow, one eye missing, tail long gone, the fur so worn it was nearly bald in patches.  
  
It’d been his, first. And then Jeannie’s – she’d _stolen_ it, the mouthy brat – and now it was George’s, and the sight of it these days seemed to punch his heart. He would’ve thrown it out, except he couldn’t do that to George. It was the same damn reason he had a house rabbit living in his kitchen - he’d had no idea how much mess a rabbit could make until Walter moved in.  
  
He still wasn’t sure of the routine. There was probably tooth-brushing and baths, but they’d been there three days, and Rodney hadn’t had even five minutes to put together a shopping list, and someone, somewhere, had to know what these kids needed. He really wished there was a hotline. A red phone. A bat-sign, only nanny-shaped.  
  
The part they _had_ gotten down, though, was that George wanted his fuzzy footie pajamas, so Rodney cranked up the air conditioner and snuggled him into bed.  
  
His eyes were so serious and he looked so lost, and damn it, Rodney was fucking lost himself.   
  
With a sigh, he smoothed George’s hair off his forehead, the fine red-gold curls exactly like Jeannie’s. He didn’t look like a McKay, though. He had dark eyes, and a thin nose, and despite their penchant for baby-fat, no McKay had ever had dimples like his, one on each cheek, lightly denting the pale skin. He was cute, but then he figured most little kids were cute – if you disregarded their disturbingly leaky noses – and George was also _family_ , so Rodney, while he’d never, ever been fond of kids, had to admit to being biased.  
  
“It’ll be fine,” Rodney said, his voice and hand just the slightest bit shaky, because he’d always been a horrible liar.  
  
He left the closet light on, cracking the door. He wasn’t sure if he needed it, but George wouldn’t say one way or the other, and Rodney remembered doing it for Jeannie occasionally. If there was ever an appropriate time for nightlights, this was most definitely it.  
  
Down in the living room, Dex was still cradling Tiffany, staring at her, half-amused, and – here was the part Rodney was strongly considering kissing him for – she was quiet. She wasn’t crying.  
  
“How—?” he whispered in awe. It was really, really hard to inspire awe in Rodney. Nothing much impressed him, since he was ten times better at everything than anybody else – well, everything _worthwhile_ , at least – but Tiffany _was not crying_.  
  
“Changed her,” Dex said. He shrugged a little, careful not to move her. “She likes that lamp, too.”  
  
The stained-glass monstrosity was an old boyfriend’s. He hadn’t been interested enough in redecorating to get rid of it as he’d shuffled his life around, and he thanked the sweet baby Jesus for his horrendously bad taste. “Colors, light, dry diaper, check,” Rodney murmured absently.   
  
He rubbed a palm over his mouth, and slumped down onto the couch. He really wanted to curl up and sleep for a month. Eyeing Dex speculatively, he asked, “When are you home?” waving a hand. “Because she hates me and obviously adores you, and if you stop by every evening to give me even just an hour of peace, I’ll pay you one hundred dollars.”  
  
One eyebrow arched. “A day?”  
  
“God, yes, anything. I mean, I meant a week, but I get giddy just thinking about whole blocks of _time_ , so.” He could afford it, and if Dex could let him shower – oh, man, he totally couldn’t even remember what a shower felt like – he would pay him double that if he wanted.  
  
“Make it a day and I’ll stay for two,” Dex said, clearly bemused, and Rodney almost _cried_ , because he had a giant yeti for a babysitter now, and it was the best idea he’d _ever had_ , and that was including the helper robot he and Radek had developed a year ago.  
  
*  
  
The yelling was loud, and got even louder as they made their way up the narrow set of rickety steps, but Cadman told him it wasn’t a big deal.  
  
“This is nothing,” she tossed over her shoulder, chuckling. “It gets worse when they’ve got a deadline.”  
  
“How do you know they don’t?” John said. Some of the shouting wasn’t even in English, and most all of it sounded rude.  
  
“Middle of the month. This is the easy stuff,” Cadman explained as they neared the top of the steps. She paused and turned to look down at him. “They usually get two warnings, and then a fine. They pay, they donate, we placate Miss Gloria when she calls to complain.” There was a thump, a shatter of glass, and Cadman winced.  
  
“Kavanagh.” She stepped forward and knocked. “They both hate him.”  
  
After a few moments heavily laden with even more thumps and curses and one very strident, “We are all infinitely dumber for even breathing your air!” the door jerked open with a sharp, “ _What_?”   
  
John leaned a hip against the top of the stair railing, shifting for a better view in the narrow vestibule.  
  
A man with wispy hair and blue, blue eyes split a glower between them, half his mouth pulled down. “Cadman.” He held out his hand and snapped his fingers impatiently.  
  
“Hi, Rodney. What’s shakin’?”   
  
“I don’t have time for social niceties, you harpy,” he groused, but he stepped aside, letting her past. “Where’s Bates?” He eyed John curiously, and John straightened up, mouth sliding into a practiced, slow grin.   
  
“Transferred out,” Cadman said happily, slapping his back. “We had a party.”  
  
“John Sheppard,” John introduced himself, following Cadman into the—lab? There were a lot of mechanical devices and shiny metal surfaces and one enormous chalkboard packed with tiny, tiny calculations, and the room, despite being perched at the top of a loosely renovated old Victorian, slanted ceilings and all, was big and surprisingly open.  
  
“Oh, my manners.” Cadman rolled her eyes. “Rodney, John. John, Rodney. And that little guy hiding under the desk is Radek—”  
  
“Am busy!” he shouted. He peeked out to scowl at them, glasses askew and hair tufting out in every direction.  
  
“Where’s Kavanagh?” Cadman asked, gazing around the room.  
  
“Locked himself in the bathroom after I threw a wrench at his head,” Rodney said blithely. Then he held out a hand and said, “Dr. Rodney McKay,” and John shook it with a genuine smile.  
  
He was kind of hot, in a rumpled professor sort of way, with his white lab coat and black-smudged khakis, and he was blatantly staring at John. John arched his brows, catching his eyes, and Rodney’s cheeks pinked just the slightest little bit before he turned back to Cadman.  
  
“Warning or fine this time?” he said with a huff.  
  
She picked up a round metal chip. “What’s this?”  
  
“Don’t touch,” he snapped, lunging for her and wrestling it out of her hands. “Keep your grubby paws off _everything_ , Cadman.”  
  
Cadman wagged a finger at him. “Hey, no attacking an officer of the law,” she teased, then John watched her eyes melt and she placed a hand on Rodney’s arm, squeezing slightly. “You all right?”  
  
Rodney darted a nervous look towards John, then nodded and rubbed a palm over his forehead. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s.” He paused. “It’s getting to be—really okay.”  
  
Cadman grinned. “I hear the big guy’s been a help.”  
  
Rodney’s mouth quirked up. “You wouldn’t think so to look at him,” he said, and then John blurted out incredulously, “Is that a _robot_?”   
  
It was small and had about fifteen arms and looked a little like a metal octopus on wheels. While he watched, it grabbed a box full of tools and disappeared back under the desk next to Radek.  
  
“That’s a HelperBot,” Rodney said, tipping his chin up, smug around the mouth.  
  
“It’s cool.” John felt that cool was totally an understatement – because: _robot!_ \- but lately saying awesome made Daisy look at him funny, so he’d been trying to cut back.   
  
Rodney snorted. “Of course it’s cool. It’s a semi-autonomous machine that responds to our specific voice patterns. Although,” he frowned, “it occasionally gets stuck in the closet, and we can’t figure out why.”  
  
“I have been taking him home,” Radek said, popping out again, pushing his glasses up his nose with the blunt end of a phillips head. “He is scared of my wife’s yappy dog. Possible glitch in brain microchip.”  
  
“We never gave him emotions,” Rodney pointed out, and John muttered, “Number five is alive,” under his breath.  
  
Rodney jabbed a finger at him. “Semi-autonomous. It’s learning. Also, I’m choosing to overlook your Short Circuit reference. You may redeem yourself with any knowledge of implausible Star Trek sciences and-or a goodwill gift of chocolate for the entire lab. And by the entire lab, I mean me, and by chocolate, I mean _actual_ chocolate, and not that cheap American waxy crap.”  
  
“He’s officially Canadian,” Cadman said, grinning, “but Miss Gloria insists he sprang from the loins of Satan himself.”  
  
“Ha, ha,” Rodney muttered darkly, and John set his hands on his hips, tilting his head to the side.   
  
“I’ll get back to you about that redemption.”  
  
“And you get a warning this time,” Cadman said. “Miss Gloria wants jelly donuts tomorrow.”  
  
“Crazy old bat,” Rodney said, grumbling, then went on pointedly, “If that’s all? Because we’d actually like to get some work done today—” The floorboards creaked towards the back of the lab, and Rodney shouted without turning around, “I am not done being angry beyond your possible comprehension!”  
  
“Try to keep it down, guys,” Cadman admonished. She almost managed a straight face.  
  
Radek waved a hand out of his hidey-hole. “Yes, bye, go away now.”  
  
“They’re really quite sweet,” Cadman assured John earnestly, eyes twinkling. Then she pecked Rodney’s cheek and, bright red, Rodney said, “Out, out,” and shoved her towards the door, grabbing John’s shoulder, pushing him along as well, and John, too stunned by Rodney’s firm grip and wide hands, stumbled docilely into the hall after Cadman.   
  
Rodney slammed the door shut behind them, shaking the frame.   
  
Cadman raised her voice and said, “I’ll drop by with some dinner tonight when I get off,” through the thin wood.  
  
It snapped back open. “Something with cheese,” he advised seriously, then shut it again with only minutely less force.  
  
Bemused, John gave her a half-smile. “So, you and him are?” he asked leadingly.  
  
“Friends and neighbors,” she said, starting back down the stairs. “Plus, he breaks up the monotony of the day without resorting to actual crime.”  
  
“He’s certainly something,” John said.  
  
“He’s an arrogant, egomaniacal genius,” she said, a hint of fondness in her tone.  
  
“With a heart of gold,” John added wryly.  
  
She laughed. “Well, I definitely wouldn’t go that far. He’s pretty cuddly when you get to know him, though.”  
  
“Cuddly?” John echoed faintly, brows arched.  
  
“Anyway,” Cadman went on, stepping out into the street, “this is a regular peace-keeping stop. Bates used to hate it, but then, he got on Rodney’s bad side right off the bat, and he’s hard to handle if he genuinely hates you.”  
  
John nodded, slipping on his sunglasses to block out the bright afternoon sun. “And he likes me.”  
  
“He thinks you’re hot, and probably not stupid,” Cadman said.  
  
“I can live with that.”  
  
*  
  
East Wallingford wasn’t the worst place to end up. Daisy hated it, yeah, but she was fifteen, and John was pretty sure fifteen-year-olds had an obligation to hate everything. John was surprisingly okay with that.  
  
It’d been a good move, he thought. Fresh, wholesome air, friendly folks, lots and lots of trees. He could get used to the solitude, used to the darkness spreading past his back porch at night, the buzzing chorus of cicadas and the drunken zigzags of late-summer fireflies.   
  
And it wasn’t like they were out in the boonies. The houses on either side of his were only fifty, maybe sixty yards away. The Millers even had a pool. Heavily wooded suburbs weren’t exactly what they were used to, though. He’d caught a raccoon rummaging through their garbage two nights in a row, and the squirrels. The squirrels were almost _evil_ out there, with their acorns and their deadly accurate aim.  
  
The screen door creaked open behind him, and he smiled around the top of his beer bottle.   
  
“I’m out,” Daisy said, diving past him down the porch steps, skateboard tucked under her arm, long dark hair twisted up in a messy ponytail.  
  
“Out where?”  
  
She swung around when she hit the yard. “Out _anywhere_.”  
  
“It’s dark,” he said pointedly, leaning against the railing.   
  
“Wow, Dad, I’m frankly astounded by your observational skills,” she said, and John took no small amount of pride in the fact that Daisy clearly took after him, not Elizabeth.  
  
“How about I veto your night cruising idea,” John said.  
  
“Oh, come _on_. What can happen? Bear mauling? I just want to check out the neighbors,” she wheedled, bouncing a little on the balls of her feet.  
  
“Hey, I’m all for a good bear mauling,” John said reasonably, “but let’s save the rest for daylight hours, ‘kay?”  
  
Daisy pouted. “But—”  
  
“Humor me. We’ll nuke some popcorn, watch a movie, practice the time-honored tradition of father-daughter bonding.” He went for the puppy eyes. She could never resist the puppy eyes.  
  
“Not Back to the Future,” she groused, stomping up the steps.  
  
“Your choice,” he said, shrugging. “I wouldn’t mind a little Thunderdome action, though.”  
  
“Two men enter,” she said blandly. “One man leaves.”  
  
“I’ll take that as agreement,” he said, opening the screen door.  
  
Daisy pulled a face. “Sometimes I wish you weren’t such a dork.”  
  
“I find that hard to believe,” he said, hooking an arm around her neck and reeling her close. He kissed the top of her head, and she ducked out of his grip, rolling her eyes.  
  
“Dork.”  
  
“You love me,” he sing-songed, following her into the kitchen and pulling out a packet of microwave popcorn. He settled it on the carousel, punched in three minutes, then turned around to smirk at her, arms crossed over his chest.  
  
“Please.” She grabbed a Pepsi from the fridge. “I tolerate you, since Mom’s a nut-job.”  
  
“Don’t talk about your mom like that,” he reproved lightly, ‘cause, hell yeah, she was crazy. She’d rather broker third-world peace treaties and commune with goat-farming health gurus than raise her own baby girl.  
  
“She called from a payphone in Nepal yesterday. I could hear sheep.”   
  
“When _aren’t_ sheep involved where your mother’s concerned?” he said absently.  
  
Twisting the cap off her soda bottle, she went on with forced casualness, “She wants to fly in for my birthday.”  
  
John’s brows went up. “Oh, really.”  
  
“Yeah.” Daisy nodded, but wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I told her not to bother.”  
  
“Daize—”  
  
“Like she’d have come _anyway_ ,” she cut him off, shrugging. “Something would’ve come up. Rampant goat disease, tribal war, weevils in the bread, whatever.”  
  
John sighed. She was right, but that didn’t make him or _her_ feel any better about it. “Hey, whatever you want, kiddo.”  
  
She brightened immediately. “I want a car.”  
  
He cocked a finger at her. “I hear ten-speeds are the new Jetas.”  
  
“ _Dad_ ,” she said, exasperated.  
  
He grinned. “We’ll see.”  
  
*  
  
Anyone who walked through Rodney’s door got the baby. After a month, most people knew this, and avoided or visited him accordingly. The teenager on the front porch was a stranger, had her eyebrow pierced, and was rolling a skateboard back and forth with one foot, but that didn’t deter Rodney. She had capable, empty hands, and he shoved Tiffany at her with a gruff, “Make yourself useful or go away.”  
  
“Gee, thanks,” she said, slipping a hand under the baby’s butt and hugging her towards her chest.  
  
Satisfied by the easy handling, Rodney nodded once and waved her inside. “Come in, sit, don’t make her cry.”  
  
“Are you always this pushy?”  
  
Rodney glowered at her. “Are you going to go away?”  
  
She tilted her head. “No.”  
  
“Then you get the baby.” He jabbed a finger at her. “That’s how it works around here. Sit. She likes that lamp. God knows why, but I’ve found that babies, even ones related to geniuses, are astronomically simple-minded.”  
  
The girl gaped at him. “She’s, like, less than a _year old_ ,” she stressed.  
  
“Eight months,” he said with a measure of smug pride. He’d kept her alive and healthy for exactly twenty-eight days. Granted, the hairy giant had helped, and Lord knew he couldn’t have gone back to work without Teyla, and Cadman fed them regularly, but still. Alive! Thriving, even, if Carson could be believed.  
  
“Officer Cadman said you had a car to sell,” she said, settling down on the couch and maneuvering Tiffany around on her knees.   
  
Rodney gazed at her curiously as she bent down a bit, puffing out her cheeks, and made a buzzing sound close to the baby’s neck. Tiffany giggled, and her pudgy hands swung up to pat her chin. She grabbed hold of her lower lip and pulled, eliciting a wince, a calm extraction, and a half-coo. The girl was pretty good with her; a plus in Rodney’s book. It meant there was a high probability she’d be a return visitor.  
  
“I have a death trap to get rid of,” he said, because his sister’s old Firebird was possibly the most unreliable machine on the planet, no matter how much tinkering he did with it. Jeannie’d gotten it when she was just a teenager herself, and while they’d always claimed to be completely unsentimental, the McKays tended to hold on to a lot of junk. And Cadman always stuck her nose in where it didn’t belong. He hadn’t mentioned selling it; it’d been sitting in the unattached garage out back since Jeannie died. “I’m not so sure I should sell it to you.”  
  
She gave him a slow grin, expression strangely familiar. “I’m totally trustworthy.”  
  
Rodney snorted. “You bring an adult back with you, and I’ll consider it,” he said.  
  
“Cool.” She bounced Tiffany and nuzzled her face and murmured, “Don’t you want to know who I am, anyway?”  
  
“Identities aren’t required for level one baby-holding,” he said, sprawling out in the chair across from her - level one being an extra pair of hands, but not necessarily good enough to be left alone with her.  
  
“I’m Daisy,” she said.  
  
“Daisy the baby-holder. Has a nice ring to it.”  
  
Daisy rolled her eyes. “Does she have a name?”  
  
“Tiffany,” he said, and he was _sick_ of defending that, because it really wasn’t his fault Jeannie’d been incredibly stubborn – that was clearly generations of McKay genes at work - and picked her unborn daughter’s name when she’d been _ten_ , and in the end it was just blatant proof that the eighties had been a monumentally horrible idea all around.   
  
She quirked her mouth up, expression teasing. “She doesn’t look like a Tiffany. She looks like a Christine. Or a Pepper.”  
  
Rodney glared. Pepper? He’d had a _dog_ named Pepper. Well, all right, _he_ hadn’t actually had the dog, because dogs were loud and messy and woefully dependent – kind of like a baby, really – but there’d been a dog named Pepper. Somewhere. Once.   
  
Before he could duly chastise her for her idiocy, though, the front door swung open and George careened in at a clumsy run, giggling. Dex shifted into the doorway, blotting out the midday sun.  
  
Daisy whistled. “Wow. You’re tall.”  
  
George stumbled to a stop in front of Rodney, blinking up at Daisy. Then he shuffled backwards, hands grabbing at Rodney’s knees.  
  
“Hey, it’s okay,” Rodney said, cupping a hand over his head.  
  
Dex ducked inside. “He had lunch.”  
  
“Good, good. Naptime, then, eh George?” He was getting the hang of routines. It’d been rough, since he was used to making his own hours, losing track of sane time, but Dex was fairly good at keeping him on a manageable timetable.  
  
During the week, Tiffany and George both spent the bulk of their days with Teyla in town, where she fed them organic vegetables and meditated and spoke in a calm, level, soothing voice, and if George didn’t come home practically glowing, Rodney wouldn’t have let them within ten feet of that holistic claptrap.   
  
George hadn’t really spoken since Rodney’d taken custody, but he wasn’t exactly sure what a three-year-old’s vocabulary should actually be. He thought he at least should’ve gotten an Uncle Rodney out of him, since he’d practiced that often enough in the past, shouting it into the phone whenever Jeannie’d been feeling particularly evil. For the moment, though, Rodney was content to let George’s silence slide. Carson had suggested professional counseling more than once, but the kid was _three_ , and he’d already been through an enormous amount of upheaval, and there was no way Rodney was going to subject him to psychoanalysis. He was going to make George feel normal, wanted and loved – to the best of his admittedly limited abilities - and he seriously doubted sending him off to visit a patronizing stranger would help.  
  
“I’ll stay with the peanut if you need to take him upstairs,” Daisy offered Rodney, only she was staring up at Dex with wide, hazel eyes, mouth flirting at the edges, and Rodney snapped, “He’s way too old for you.”  
  
Probably. Dex had a babyface under all his facial hair that made his age sort of ambiguous.   
  
Dex grinned with teeth. “You interested, McKay?”  
  
“What? Oh Jesus, you’re hitting on me.” Rodney flailed. “That’s so very wrong.”  
  
“Why?” Daisy said, head cocked. “He’s hot.”  
  
“Yeah, McKay. Why?” Ronon echoed in a near growl, his expression darkly amused, and Rodney sputtered, “We’re not having this conversation,” covering George’s ears with his palms.  
  
Daisy laughed. “You are so weird.”  
  
Rodney pressed his lips together and scowled. “George and I are going upstairs,” he said huffily, then pointed at Dex. “You, don’t leave her alone with the baby. She’s only a level one.” Dex was a level fifteen, which meant that if anything ever happened to Rodney, Dex would be in full control of the family.   
  
Dex didn’t actually _know_ that, of course, because Rodney was fairly certain Dex would be completely _horrified_ , but he was good with both kids and it was either him or Cadman, and the thought of Cadman raising little Tiffany and George to be gun-toting, uniformed government patsies was enough to make him physically ill.   
  
Dex might teach them how to throw knives, though. Rodney had mixed feelings about that.  
  
“You’ve got a _bunny_?” Daisy said as he was herding George towards the steps. There was an unsaid ‘ _oh my god, so cute!_ ’ buried in her tone.  
  
He glanced back and saw her crouched down in front of the baby gate, Tiffany propped on her thigh, fingers poking through the plastic lattice. Walter had both paws up, begging for treats like the hussy he was, giving her his best, doe-eyed, they’re-starving-me! look.   
  
Dex was eyeing Walter warily, looming over Daisy, arms crossed. He didn’t trust him, since the rabbit had gnawed a decent-sized hole at the hem of his favorite jeans, and always managed to trip him up with his mad dashes whenever he attempted to walk across the kitchen floor.   
  
Rodney didn’t trust Walter because the toaster no longer worked, and he’d been through three telephone cords in the past month. Plus, Rodney wasn’t the neatest of workers, and Walter tended to make nests with his Very Important Papers.   
  
“You let him out, you pay the price,” Rodney said ominously. He’d lost him twice under the couch for hours, and Rodney suspected he could worm his way up into the cushions given enough time.  
  
“He’s a bunny rabbit,” Daisy said, nuzzling Tiffany’s neck as she pet Walter, who’d lowered his head in the I’m-so-adorable-and-submissive routine he’d perfected to lull unsuspecting people into opening the gate. “What trouble could an itsty witsy buns—”  
  
“Dear god, stop baby-talking to him,” Rodney said. Bunnies, toddlers, babies, giants, teenagers—what had his life come to?   
  
George tugged on his pant leg and yawned.   
  
Rodney ruffled his hair. “Okay, naptime, right, let’s go.” He pulled him up and fit him on his hip in a practiced movement. It was almost comfortable, having George’s small body tucked up against him, head tipped onto his shoulder. His world couldn’t get any weirder.   
  
*  
  
Rodney hastily shoved the _Parents_ magazine under his pile of papers as someone slid into the booth across from him. His eyes widened in surprise when he glanced up to find Officer John Sheppard, complete with crisp blue uniform, hands cupping a mug of coffee, grinning at him. God, he was hot, with that half self-effacing mouth, and the honestly pretty eyes, and hair just as messy as Radek’s, but somehow ten times sexier. “Seriously,” he said without preamble, “how do you get your hair to do that?”  
  
“I have a metal plate in my head,” Sheppard deadpanned.  
  
Rodney’s face scrunched up uncomfortably. “Really?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Oh.” Rodney’s neck got warm, flushing up his cheeks in subtle embarrassment, but Sheppard just sipped his coffee and nodded towards Rodney’s papers.  
  
“What exactly is it that you do, Dr. McKay?” he said, seeming genuinely curious.  
  
“Oh, I’m. I’m an astrophysicist. Among other things, of course, since a man of my genius can hardly be expected to narrow his focus exclusively, but mainly right now I—”  
  
“Physics,” Sheppard said, cutting him off. “And robots.”  
  
Rodney waved a hand. “Robotics is a side hobby for Radek.” The HelperBot – which had an amazing amount of human-like quirks for a machine – was originally supposed to resemble a monkey, but they hadn’t perfected a workable shell.   
  
“Okay,” Sheppard said, lounging back against his seat, openly amused. “So why’re a bunch of scientists out here in the middle of nowhere, then?”  
  
“It’s hardly the middle of nowhere,” Rodney scoffed, since he’d been in much more remote places than the bustling little mountain township of East Wallingford – a lonely outpost in Siberia came to mind – “and I’m here because I was recruited to teach AP Physics for a pittance, with the bonus of breaking as many young minds as I can—”   
  
Sheppard’s eyes rounded. “Wait, you’re a _high school teacher_?”  
  
Rodney scowled. “It’s fulfilling,” he said. Was that so hard to believe? High school kids were massively easier to handle than university undergrads, and most of them even appreciated a good verbal beating. Crying was minimal. For the most part.   
  
“Radek’s here, of course,” Rodney went on, “because he can’t get along without me. Kavanagh’s here because he’s my own personal demon, and I probably couldn’t get rid of him even if I set him on fire and dropped him down a bottomless well.” Kavanagh was an idiot, but an idiot with a brain, which was the only reason Rodney hadn’t completely banned him from the lab. Yet.  
  
“And you three are working on?” Sheppard asked, brows arched, and Rodney recognized an interrogation face when he saw one, which probably said a lot about his past.  
  
He narrowed his eyes in suspicion. “It’s classified.”  
  
“Hey,” Sheppard held up his hands, “I was just curious.”  
  
“Right.” Rodney started gathering up his papers, swallowing the bitter dregs of his coffee with a slight grimace. “I should go.”  
  
“Wait, I wasn’t.” He caught Rodney’s wrist.   
  
Rodney pointedly glared down where their hands met, and the sight of those long fingers wrapped over his pale skin _was not hot_. It really, really wasn’t.   
  
Sheppard let him go with obvious reluctance, a sheepish pull at his lips. “McKay—”  
  
“I’m sure I’ll see you around, Sheppard,” Rodney cut in as dismissively as he could, and he clenched his teeth against Sheppard’s ridiculous puppy eyes – what self-respecting grown man used _puppy eyes_ , for god’s sake? – and stepped up to the diner counter, plopping his stuff down before rummaging for a few dollars to pay his check.   
  
Chuck set a full to-go cup of coffee down in front of him – routine – and then he started off towards his lab, an officer of the law scrambling after – _not_ routine, and Rodney tried very hard to keep his temper. “Is there a reason you’re being this annoying?” he said, flashing Sheppard a sideways glare.  
  
Sheppard shrugged. “Just figured I’d get to know you a little, since my daughter’s trying to talk me into letting her buy your car.”  
  
Rodney stopped dead in his tracks. “ _You’re_ Daisy’s father?”   
  
It fit, of course, because Daisy was just as persistent and stubborn underneath a similar veneer of indifference, and she’d weaseled her way into level three baby-holding status by the quirk of her lips and trust-me hazel eyes. Not that she didn’t deserve the standing, of course, since she’d survived feeding the terminally messy Tiffany with true affection. And, most importantly, she kept coming back. It was all well and good to be competently helpful _once_ , but several return visits definitely warranted Rodney’s grudging respect.  
  
“She’s a firecracker, isn’t she?” Sheppard said.  
  
Rodney rolled his eyes, then picked up his pace again. “The car isn’t worth much of anything as it is,” he said, “but if she pays for the parts, we can piece it together.”  
  
“It’s road-safe, right?” Sheppard asked, a hint of worry in his voice.  
  
Rodney snorted. “At the moment? Not even a little. It’s a bad deal, Sheppard,” he pointed out. He was still half-torn about getting rid of it in the first place. It was his last untouched refuge, and some evenings, when Dex gave him his solid two hours of solitude, he’d prop the garage doors open and slide onto the cracked leather, watching the hazy sky sink into twilight above the house, turning pinks and oranges and velvety purples, and he swore he could still feel Jeannie, still smell that cloying vanilla scent she always wore, still see her McKay blue eyes mocking him for his fancy in the rearview mirror. McKays didn’t believe in ghosts.  
  
“You’ll teach her, though,” Sheppard said slowly, breaking Rodney’s reverie, and Rodney glanced at him again, noting the speculative gleam in his eyes.   
  
“Oh god,” he groaned, “you’re going to foist her off on me for the rest of the summer, aren’t you?”  
  
“Hey, no one’s foisting anything on anyone,” Sheppard protested, but he was grinning mischievously, the bastard. “I just think it’d be cool for her to learn about cars. I wanted to be a mechanic once.”  
  
“Of course you did,” Rodney said dryly. Then, “Fine. She puts in the work, she gets the car.” Stopping just outside Miss Gloria’s old Victorian, he held out his hand. “Deal?”  
  
“All right. Deal,” Sheppard said, sliding his palm against his, deliberately lingering as he caught Rodney’s eyes, and the grin that bloomed across his face was more open than any one he’d given him a glimpse of before.  
Rodney’s breath hitched and he wrested his hand out of Sheppard’s grip, because flirting. Jesus, he missed flirting and dating and _kissing_ , and it’d only been just over a month since Jeannie and Caleb had died, flipping his life inside out, but god. It felt like it’d been forever. He bit his lower lip, and Sheppard’s gaze automatically dropped to his mouth, and Rodney took a giant step backwards.  
  
“Rodney,” Sheppard started, body coiled to follow his retreat.  
  
Rodney shook his head. “I’ve got to. I mean—” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, towards the side door leading upstairs to the attic lab. And then he fled.  
  
*  
  
John had never actually regretted marrying Elizabeth, despite the fights and the yelling and the crazy three a.m. phone calls from Abu Dhabi, because the two years of hell had given him Daisy. Little, perfect Daisy with her mop of dark curls and pointy-tipped ears and wide hazel eyes, who’d been too busy staring at the world in spastic wonder to eat or sleep properly for months on end.  
  
That’s all it’d taken to break Elizabeth. Their separation and eventual divorce proceedings had been spent oceans and countries apart, and John’d found himself the single father of one very stubborn baby girl.   
  
It’d been hard. Beyond hard. At twenty-three, being solely responsible for a tiny life had been both terrifying and as exhilarating as his first solo flight, a high and almost giddy rush thrumming his blood. And every time he looked at her over the years, traced the curve of her brow, cheek, saw the way she smirked, tilted her jaw – it all reminded him that he’d never really come down. Being a father, a parent, had nothing to do with settling, but Elizabeth had never ever seen it that way.  
  
He couldn’t honestly say that bothered him, though.  
  
John pulled the carton of ice cream closer to him, spoon-fighting Daisy for dominion over a chunk of cookie dough. He won easily and gave her a smug smile. “So,” he said thickly, swallowing his prize, “how’s it going at McKay’s?”  
  
Daisy shrugged without lifting her elbows off the island counter. “Good.”  
  
“Yeah? Maybe I should stop by,” he said casually.  
  
Daisy’s gaze sharpened on his face. “Why?”  
  
“Daize, you spend two hours a day over there. At _least_.”  
  
“So what?” she said defensively. “You don’t have to check up on me and the doc.”  
  
John stared at her incredulously. Blinked. “Are you kidding me?”  
  
Daisy’s cheeks heated, turning bright red, the fair, easily flushed skin a gift from her mother. “What?” she asked, but it was a tiny ‘what?’ and Sheppards had absolutely no defense against brilliance. He should have seen it coming.  
  
In college, Elizabeth had blindsided him with a dissertation on eastern politics, and even though he’d had no interest at all in the subject, he’d been panting from the moment she’d opened her mouth, spilling out competent three-syllable words.  
  
“You have a crush on _Rodney McKay_ ,” John said.   
  
“So do you!” she shot back hotly, scowling, almost as if she was _mad_ at him for it, and John was _not going there_.  
  
He sighed and pushed the ice cream towards her. “Well, we’re both screwed then,” he said tiredly.  
  
“He’s so _smart_ ,” Daisy whined, scowl softening into a frown, and John snorted a laugh.  
  
“Why don’t we find you a genius your own age,” he said. He managed to resist pointing out that McKay was old enough to be her father, but it was a close call.  
  
She sighed, ignoring him. “He can… look at a tiny piece and see everything it could ever be.”  
  
John reached out and smoothed a thumb over the back of her hand. Possibilities molded into fact through perseverance and a brain the size of the entire galaxy. That was seriously hard to resist.  
  
“You should ask him out,” Daisy said suddenly.  
  
John arched a brow. “I don’t see that going over too well.” The guy had backed off fast enough when he’d felt him out before.  
  
“You should.” Daisy nodded, eyes clouding, a dreamy, scary smile stretching her lips. It figured she’d push John at Rodney once she’d resigned herself to the fact that she couldn’t have him herself.   
  
“Bad idea,” he insisted.   
  
“It’s a great idea.” She waved her spoon at him. “I mean, better you than Dex.”  
  
He straightened up against the counter. “Who’s Dex?”  
  
“Oh,” she said airily, “just his totally hot neighbor.”  
  
Hunh. That actually didn’t sit all that well with him. He leaned forward and dug out another scoop of ice cream. “You really think he’d say yes?”  
  
Daisy shrugged. “Maybe. Just, um,” she tilted her head to the side, “wear a tight shirt or something. Be smart.”  
  
John furrowed his brows. “Be smart?”  
  
She picked up the chocolate syrup and squeezed just about half the bottle into the carton. “Do that math thing you do.”  
  
“I’ll keep it in mind,” he said, bemused.  
  
“I mean it.” Daisy nodded. “He’ll be impressed. He makes me play this prime/not-prime game with him all the time, and you’ve got that whole,” she circled her spoon in the air, “solving complex equations in your head thing going for you.”  
  
John wasn’t so sure he wanted to wow Rodney with his ‘math thing.’ Okay, wait. That was a complete, knee-jerk lie. He’d reached an age where being a dork wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, and if it got him into Rodney’s pants, well. He might even break out his double major in aeronautical engineering and applied mathematics. Maybe dazzle him with a bit of his mad pilot skills—  
  
“He’s kinda afraid of heights,” Daisy said, licking her spoon.  
  
“Okay.” Flying was out, then.   
  
“And he doesn’t do all that well with enclosed spaces, either.”  
  
Feeling slightly queasy – way too much sugar – he fit the lid back on the ice cream carton and shoved it into the already packed freezer. He dropped his spoon into the sink with a clatter, then reached for Daisy’s.  
  
“Oh, and his sister died,” she added, almost nonchalantly, “like, two months ago in a plane crash.”   
  
“Jesus.” He leaned back against the stove.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
*  
  
Chuck’s Diner was on the corner of Main and Birch, across from the municipal building. A smooth-faced ex-marine named Stackhouse presided over the grill – he made a mean hashbrown and called John ‘Boss’ - and there was a steady stream of teenagers trading shifts so often to wait tables that John knew only a handful of names, even after a few months of patronage.   
  
Chuck himself manned the counter, and he had the best coffee in town.  
  
And if John got there early enough on weekday mornings, he’d catch Rodney, shoveling in a hearty breakfast with an enormous cup of the famed brew at his elbow, papers in messy piles all around him.   
  
“So,” John said, slipping onto the vinyl seat across from him, “Daisy’s having fun.” He paused. Added, “I think.”  
  
“She has a crush on me,” Rodney said absently without looking up at him. He tapped a pen on his lower lip, making a humming noise, the underlying tone a mixture of ‘busy now’ and ‘go away’ and ‘mmmm, bacon.’  
  
John leaned back, stretching his legs out to bump Rodney’s. “Seems to run in the family,” he said, and Rodney’s head snapped up, eyes wide on his face. John arched his brows pointedly.  
  
“Uh,” Rodney said awkwardly.   
  
He looked ridiculously adorable, expression wavering between pleased and terrified, and John plunged right in on, “Care to have dinner with me this Friday?”  
  
Rodney blurted, “I can’t,” and then, right after, “I only have two hours,” and John just stared at him.  
  
“Okay,” he said finally, unsure what that even meant.  
  
“I mean,” Rodney babbled, waved a hand back and forth, “I mean, if I’m back, if we’re gone for only two hours, then yes.”  
  
“Two hours,” John repeated slowly. It was a little odd to be given a time frame – especially one so short – but John was willing to go along with it. Rodney was kind of weird. It made things more interesting.  
  
Rodney nodded jerkily. “Right, yes.” Then he pressed his lips together, color high on his cheeks, and - goddamn it - John just wanted to reach over the table and grab him by the t-shirt and drag him into a kiss.   
  
A slow and dirty kiss that’d leave him slack and pliable and mussed and he really, really couldn’t wait ‘til Friday. Two hours? Maybe they could just skip the meal.  
  
“Got any food preferences?” John asked, running his thumb over the chipped Formica edge of the table, keeping his hands dutifully to himself.  
  
Rodney’s teeth clicked as he seemed to snap back into himself, and he straightened up, jabbing a fork at John. “Just no citrus, unless you want me to die a horrible, painful death.”  
  
“No citrus, right.” John nodded, and Rodney eyed him suspiciously. “What?”  
  
“Nothing,” Rodney said, then cocked his head and narrowed a glare over John’s shoulder and asked, “Who’s that hooligan with Daisy?”  
  
A couple things about that question tripped John up, not the least of them being the completely serious use of the word ‘hooligan’ – because: hooligan? Who said that?   
  
It was, John checked his watch, just past eight on a summer Tuesday, and the fact that Daisy was even _up_ , let alone dressed and out of the house, was very, very strange. He twisted around and spotted Daisy at the front door of the diner, board leaning against her left leg, standing next to a very tall, very thin young man in a neat yellow polo and khakis.   
  
“You’d know better than me, Rodney,” John said, although really. The kid hardly looked like a ‘hooligan.’ Young Republicans were probably more his speed, though that didn’t do much to ease John’s mind. He wore _glasses_. Daisy was staring up at him as if he’d invented stars, one hand nervously fidgeting with the ragged hem of her t-shirt, and danger signs were flashing in front of John’s eyes.   
  
“That’s Nicky Jackson,” their current waitress said, sliding a mug in front of John and topping off Rodney’s coffee. Her nametag was covered with a piece of masking tape that read Ask Me – which John had, before, and he vaguely remembered that it started with an S. Or a C.   
  
“That crackpot’s back in town?” Rodney said, taking a gulp of his fresh cup. Then he hummed speculatively.   
  
When he didn’t say anything else, John prompted him with an echo of, “Crackpot?” and Rodney tapped his fingers impatiently on the table.  
  
“He’s a linguist,” he got to his feet, “among other things, possibly even more useless to the world at large. Watch Daisy with that son of his.” Shoving his things into a pile, tucking them under his arm, John thought Rodney might’ve mumbled something about Jackson being a stubborn asshole, but he wasn’t quite sure.  
  
“So, Friday?” John reminded Rodney just as he was about to step away, towards the front counter.  
  
“Oh, right.” He blushed again. “Yes.”  
  
And then John completely embarrassed Daisy – totally on purpose – by calling out her name and waving.  
  
Rodney rolled his eyes and left.

 

*

  
“You are behaving oddly,” Radek said to Rodney, slapping Kavanagh’s hands away as the man made a grab for a donut. “No,” he snapped, as if talking to his wife’s yappy dog.  
  
“I’m not behaving oddly,” Rodney protested. He bit into a jelly-filled donut and gave Kavanagh a smug, powdery grin.  
  
“See,” Radek narrowed his eyes at him, “you are in far too good a mood. It is disconcerting.”  
  
“Guess who’s back?” he asked brightly.   
  
“Daniel Jackson.”  
  
Rodney’s face fell into a scowl.  
  
“What?” Radek said mock-innocently, eyes wide. “You told me to guess.”  
  
“Yes, well, it was an easy deduction,” Rodney said, somewhat bitter, “since summer is rapidly coming to a close, and who does Nick think he’s kidding?” Nick was as wild as his mother, with a skewed sort of logic that’d continuously gotten him into trouble, and Rodney really hadn’t recognized him. Glasses, for god’s sake. Light brown hair, instead of his usual jet black. Was he trying his father’s persona on for size?  
  
“Nicky is merely misguided, as his mother is a crazy woman.”  
  
“His mother’s a klepto,” Rodney amended slightly. “Hot, though.”  
  
“Yet this does not explain your cheerfulness,” Radek said, swinging the conversation neatly back around. “Since you mostly cannot stand Dr. Jackson.”  
  
“Oh, fine,” Rodney snapped, but there wasn’t much bite to it. “I’m going out with Sheppard.”  
  
Radek’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead. “Going out where?”  
  
“To eat. Dinner. As in a _date_ ,” Rodney clarified, annoyed, because Radek, the Czech bastard, knew exactly what he’d meant.  
  
A grin spread across Radek’s mouth. “Good.”  
  
“Good?”  
  
“Yes, good. You deserve some fun. My wife, she is ready to set you up, and I do not think you would like her taste in men,” he said wryly, pushing his glasses up his nose.  
  
Rodney snorted. Radek was by no means a terrible catch, but Rodney was never, ever going to tell him that. It was bad enough he acknowledged his intelligence on an almost daily basis. “Of course,” he said, “this won’t be _much_ of date, since I’ll have to be back by eight.”  
  
Radek stared at him. “Why?”  
  
“George’s bedtime.”  
  
“Rodney,” Radek said patiently, “I am sure Ronon can handle putting George to bed this once.”  
  
“Which isn’t the point.” Rodney glared at Kavanagh as the man slunk forward and grabbed a glazed donut, but graciously let him slide, even when he sent Rodney a petulant sneer. He was going to have to talk to Samantha at the Institute about getting another lackey, because Kavanagh was getting on his last nerve.  
  
“Are we going to work at any time today?” Kavanagh asked haughtily.  
  
Radek growled at him. “ _We_ are going to work. _You_ are going to sit quietly in your corner until we need you to hold something still.” He turned to Rodney and added, “He is less useful than a trained monkey,” which sounded exactly like something Rodney himself would say, and it was only slightly creepy hearing it come from Radek.  
  
Mostly, Rodney was just proud.  
  
*  
  
Rodney once spent a full year in Siberia with a passel of hippie environmentalists, building up an astronomical tolerance for vodka and bearded women, but that hell didn't even compare to Tiffany in a righteous snit. Or, you know, _teething_.   
  
The books and magazines assured him that cold, water-filled teething rings did wonders, but those books and magazines could just bite Rodney's ass, because Tiffany hated them and the horses they rode in on. A wet washcloth - after three frantic calls to Carson - seemed to actually _work_ , and she was happily sucking on the terrycloth, propped up in the corner of the couch, and Rodney was dead, numb, not quite passed out but lurching dangerously towards it, spread out across his living room floor.  
  
He stared up blankly, raw eyes frozen wide. Something scratched and dug at his t-shirt, small teeth scraped his side as the material bunched and pulled, and somehow Walter had gotten out of the kitchen, but Rodney really didn't care.   
  
Gray dawn was steadily stealing across the ceiling. He was fairly sure it was Thursday. A furry nose nudged his cheek, there was a terse yank on his hair, and he rolled his head to blink at Walter, all twitching whiskers and big bulging eyes and tiny sharp teeth. Past him, Rodney could see the old baby gate and the hole Walter'd made in the mesh; little pieces of plastic scattered on the rug. He'd had an industrious night. Too bad his pea-sized, curious brain had led him straight back to his jailor. Though Rodney honestly didn't have the energy to do anything about it.  
  
He half-heartedly lifted a hand and Walter took off for the couch, legs kicking up behind him. Great.  
  
There was a rustle-thump from the stairwell, and Rodney tipped his head back to see George slowly making his way down the steps, one hand clutching the railing, his other fisting the tied-together shoelaces of an old pair of Rodney’s sneakers. He’d taken to dragging them around the house like a security blanket, which was odd, but hey. Whatever made him happy.  
  
Rodney mustered up a smile for the toddler, and George ran full tilt for him as soon as he hit the landing, clocking him in the head with the shoes and toppling against his side with a too-wide-awake laugh.  
  
Rodney would’ve given his—well, not any of his limbs, actually, but maybe a box full of donuts or his favorite pen or something to be able to go back up to bed and sleep for at least another three hours. Instead, he hefted himself to his feet, let George turn on his cartoons, and stumbled into the kitchen to make breakfast.  
  
*  
  
John watched bemusedly, fists on his hips, as the youngest member of the East Wallingford police force wriggled his way under David Parrish’s front porch.  
  
“I think it’s a—oh, shit.” Ford scrambled backwards so fast he landed sprawled on his ass, then crab-walked another yard before twisting around onto his knees, feet, and diving behind John.  
  
“What the hell?” John had his sidearm out just in time to catch sight of the sloped head and telltale black and white markings of an abnormally – to John, at least, who’d never seen one outside of the TV – huge skunk, illuminated by the beam of Ford’s hastily dropped flashlight.   
  
It ambled out, sniffed curiously in their direction, then went right back under the porch, plumed tail luckily still lowered and un-cocked.   
  
“There’s your wild animal.” He grinned at Parrish. There was no way in hell he was gonna even attempt to remove that.  
  
“Call in Dex,” Ford said, still hovering behind John.  
  
“It’s a little early to call someone out for a skunk,” John said. The sky was still mostly dark, the moon a pale white outline. He tended to lose track of time on the nightshift, but he’d guess it was around five.  
  
Ford shrugged. “He’s probably up anyway. McKay makes a lot of noise. Better to get ‘em while he’s sleepy, too.”  
  
“Who, Dex or the skunk?”   
  
Beside John, Parrish worried his fingers in the hem of his shirt. “Oh, I’d _leave_ him there, you know, but Betsy gets into absolutely _everything_ ,” he fretted, and Betsy, a handsome, bluetick coonhound, pressed her nose up against the screen door and woofed balefully at them.  
  
Half of John’s mouth quirked up. “All right,” he told Ford. “Call in Dex.” He was more than a little curious about the man, anyway. Rodney’s neighbor. Who, in addition to being hot, was also apparently _dreamy_.   
  
He listened absently as Ford flipped open his cell and dialed Dex, and Parrish had wandered in and out of the house with a couple of hot mugs of coffee by the time a lifted pickup with monster wheels pulled into the drive, crunching over the gravel and grinding to a stop next to the police SUV.   
  
Dex - large, dreadlocked and, wow, Daisy was so right about his hotness – slid the caged skunk into the bed of his truck just about twenty minutes later. The trick, apparently, was to offer a mound of tasty treats and be incredibly still, quiet and patient.  
  
Parrish fidgeted nervously around a thank you, and John held out a hand.  
  
Dex engulfed it with his own and growled, “Watch it with McKay,” completely out of nowhere, and John grimaced as Dex’s grip tightened, cracking his knuckles audibly before releasing him.  
  
“Um.” John very carefully did not shake his throbbing fingers.  
  
“This is off record, right?” Dex asked Ford.  
  
John’s eyes shot wide. He wasn’t going to punch him, was he?  
  
“Non-capture, skunk wandered off,” Ford said, smiling, then added for John, “Procedure is euthanasia and rabies testing for most wild animal captures.”  
  
“Nothing wrong with him,” Dex said, disgruntled. Disgruntled seemed to be a default with him. He was kind of intimidating. John decided that he never ever wanted to get on his bad side – he was pretty sure it’d involve lots of pain and humiliation, with a high probability of tears.  
  
Dex sent him a sharp grin before climbing inside the truck cab, slamming the door shut.  
  
John scrounged up a smile and gave him a loose salute as he drove off.  
  
*  
  
Rodney couldn’t remember ever getting so wound up about a date. Granted, he had trouble remembering past dates in general, since lately everything was a blur of dirty diapers and strained peas and bedtime stories about puppies and that Spanish cartoon George was obsessed with.  
  
Daisy was sprawled on her stomach on his couch, legs kicked up, head leaning on one hand, idly flipping through the TV channels with a rabbit-gnawed remote – most of the buttons were entirely unreadable.   
  
Tiffany was in her bouncy chair, staring fixedly at her lamp, listening to the plink-plink muzak of comatose babies everywhere, and George was squeezed into the tight triangle of space between the side table and Rodney’s overstuffed recliner, playing with his plastic dinosaurs, a naked Malibu Barbie, and an avocado colored colander.   
  
“You realize this is weird, right?” Daisy asked.  
  
“Weird, what?” Rodney looked down at himself. “It’s the pants, isn’t it? I look like a banker.”  
  
Daisy rolled her eyes. “I meant,” she said, “that I’m _here_ , and you’re going out with my dad.”  
  
Rodney paused. “Um. I didn’t think—I mean, I’m sure it’s—do you have a—” he flapped a hand, “—problem with this? Because if you do, you should’ve said something before, since not showing is tacky and I’m far too old to stand someone up _anyway_ —”  
  
“Doc,” Daisy said, “it’s fine. It’s just weird seeing you trying to impress my _dad_ , who’s, like, the biggest slice of cheese on the planet.”  
  
“Somehow, I doubt he’d appreciate you telling me that.”  
  
“It’s kind of hard for him to hide it,” she said, a half-resigned, half-amused expression on her face.  
  
“So,” Rodney shifted on his feet, smoothing hands over his shirt, “I don’t look like a banker?”  
  
She scrunched up her nose and said, “You should just wear jeans.”  
  
He narrowed his eyes. “You have inside information.” It wasn’t a question.  
  
“Maybe.” She grinned. Then she shifted up and lounged against the corner of the couch, fingers toying with the lip of her water glass resting on the side table. “So. What do you know about Nick Jackson?”  
  
“No comment.” It was odd, but Rodney felt strangely maternal around Daisy, like he was one step away from talking about his _feelings_ or gossiping about boys, and if that ever actually happened, he was pretty sure he’d have to shoot himself.  
  
“He’s cute.”  
  
Rodney snorted. “His father’s a pouty-lipped, glorified librarian and his mother’s a manipulative harpy with a pretentious accent.”  
  
“Still.” She sighed.  
  
“There is every possibility he’ll grow up to be an archeologist,” Rodney warned her, wagging a finger. “Or a high-priced whore who sleeps his way into political mayhem.”  
  
Daisy cocked her head. “Should you be talking like that around me?”  
  
“Probably not,” Rodney admitted, although as long as Daisy didn’t repeat anything potentially damaging – which he didn’t think she would - he wasn’t going to bother curbing his tongue around her. He had to do that often enough with his students, since he’d found an _overabundance_ of crying often led to painful parent-teacher conferences, and some parents were not only horrendously narrow-minded, but most times on a lower comprehension scale than their kids, making the conferences a complete waste of his time and incredibly, stab-your-brain dull.  
  
“Awesome.” Daisy grinned lazily. “I’m still going out with Nick.”  
  
“Hold up, wait.” Rodney raised a hand. “You’re _going out_ with him? Does your father know this?” he asked.  
  
She rolled her eyes. “Duh. Of course not.”  
  
“And you’re not worried I’ll let him in on this little secret tonight?”  
  
“Doc, if you two end up discussing my love-life on your date,” she shook her head, “it’ll just be sad.”  
  
Rodney conceded the point. And then went to get changed.  
  
*  
  
Though John would deny it to his death, he was a little nervous. Until he realized Rodney was just as, if not more nervous than him, twisting his fingers in a paper napkin, eyes big and borderline panicky, and his cool came back in spades. He grinned loosely across the table at him.  
  
“I’m trying to figure out,” Rodney said slowly, “how I rate a crummy pizza joint.”  
  
John grinned wider. “You love this place,” he said. Daisy could occasionally be surprisingly helpful.  
  
“Yes, yes,” Rodney said, nodding, finally relaxing a bit in his seat. “But.” He glanced around, expression still sort of affronted.  
  
The interior of the place was a joke. Framed maps of Italy, crayoned drawings from the local kids of the famous boot, were crammed tight on the walls. The tables were checkerboard white and red, the spray of flowers dotting the center laughably fake. The open kitchen was loud - they tossed pies, and lost more than a few – and the floor was normally packed tight for dinner.   
  
John thought it was great, and he especially loved the old Asteroids game in the corner, tucked between the two single stalled bathrooms. He jerked his head towards the group of teens gathered around it. “Bet we can get those kids off of that with five bucks,” he said.  
  
Rodney looked like he _really_ wanted to say something biting, but then got to his feet with a shrug. “Sure, why not, since apparently you’ve got the social acuity of a fourteen-year-old.”  
  
“I’m pretty competitive, too,” John said brightly, following Rodney through the wind of overtaxed tables.  
  
Rodney paused and turned to look at him archly. “Are you going to cry if I don’t let you win?”  
  
“Maybe.” John sort of bounced on his heels, feeling playful. “I don’t like to imagine that sort of trauma, though.”  
  
John could see a smile hidden at the downslope of Rodney’s mouth, shining in his eyes even as he grumbled, “Prepare to get your ass kicked, Sheppard.”  
  
*  
  
Because he was an excellent teacher, despite having zero tolerance for fools and morons, Rodney handed out his email on the first day of class, and made himself available to students after school hours for most of the entire semester. He encouraged an open dialogue, even if that dialogue was comprised mostly of him yelling, and they seemed to appreciate his candor. It was one of the reasons the administration had given him the extremes, remedial and advanced. He snapped the one group into shape without mercy and made the other work harder than they’d ever worked before.  
  
Nick Jackson wasn’t in either of his sections. He was a decent student, but tended to skate by without really trying. Felger, Rodney’s grade partner, almost always spent half his lunch bemoaning the kid’s wasted potential.  
  
Rodney really didn’t care.  
  
“All right, spit it out, why are you here?” he said irritably after Nick slid inside his room, closing the door behind him.  
  
Nick cleared his throat, fidgeting in front of Rodney’s desk. “So, you’re, uh, dating Mr. Sheppard, right?”  
  
Rodney sharpened a glare on him. “And that is any of your business how?”  
  
He shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “I really like Daisy.”  
  
Rodney stared at him blankly, waited a beat, then said, “Really, where are you going with this? Because as we speak, Jeremy Fitzhugh is having a spastic fit in the hall over the C I gave him on his horrendously ill-prepared paper on Euclidean dynamics.” He could see the student’s red face through the narrow pane of glass inset in the door.  
  
“Mr. Sheppard, he.” Nick dipped his head, a move reminiscent of his father, but somehow he managed to make it look less affected and more sincere. “I think he’s gotten a bad impression of me.”  
  
“I can’t see how,” Rodney said, widening his eyes in mock-wonder. Seriously, Nick was a pain in the ass, and dear god, he was using Jackson’s infamous pout. Jesus. “Fine, _fine_. I’ll try to,” he grimaced, “say something nice about you, but I can’t promise it’ll make any difference. Now get out of here and let Jeremy in before he hyperventilates himself into passing out.”  
  
“Thanks, Dr. McKay,” Nick said brightly, and his smile was pretty much the only physical feature - other than his dark hair, of course, which Rodney still wasn’t sure why he’d gotten rid of - that he’d blatantly inherited from his mother. Try as he might, Rodney’d never been able to see any guile hidden in the way it lit up his entire face, and Vala had that same exact charm.  
  
He grumbled, “Yes, of course,” and waved him off with a glower he, embarrassingly, actually had to force.   
  
*  
  
Rodney wasn’t sure he and John were actually dating. They met at Pico’s on Tuesdays and Fridays, and John held the highest score at Asteroids and Rodney pondered half-hearted plots to break in late at night and take the thing apart, hiding all the pieces, but he was secretly amused by John’s victory dance – Daisy was right; for all his cool, he could be appealingly dorky.   
  
Most times they ended up making out in John’s truck. Occasionally, when Rodney slumped down exhausted in the booth with half-lidded eyes and barely contained yawns, they’d part ways at the door, and John would squeeze his arm, shackle his wrist and reel Rodney in for a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth.  
  
With the onslaught of fall and school, Rodney’s hours were insane – he took the rugrats to the lab three evenings a week, let them play with the robot – and there had to be something very, very wrong with John because he a) took what little Rodney gave him without complaint, and b) never asked _why_ Rodney had so little to give. Rodney was torn between relief at the casualness of their apparent relationship and being pissed off that John wasn’t more invested. Or hurt. He could’ve been a little hurt.  
  
Rodney, of course, was getting dangerously attached. It had something to do with his complete lack of a social life _outside_ of John, maybe, but mostly he was sure it was because John practically came alive under his hands, flushed and breathless with this fascinating thread of control, a sharpness in his dark eyes holding him back, since, seriously, there was only so much fooling around two thirty-somethings could do in the extended cab of a Ford truck.  
  
So, basically, that was why Rodney finally gave in and asked Daisy if she could take over babysitting duties when Dex’s time was up, then he told John he was taking him on a proper adult date, and to wear a tie.  
  
John didn’t wear a tie.   
  
It was inconsequential, though, since Rodney’d been mainly joking about that part, and he tugged on the sleeves of his sport coat and worried the buttons on his shirt while John just smirked at him over the set of flickering candlesticks.  
  
It felt weird having an entire kid-free evening spread before him. Rodney’s cell was heavy in his pocket, and he fought the urge to check the settings again, making sure the ring was loud enough to be heard over the din of the restaurant.   
  
His fingers gripped the edge of the table, and he realized, belatedly, while John’s gaze idly scanned their surroundings, that before they’d always been _doing something_.  
  
They’d played Asteroids and Miss PacMan or drew on the paper placemats – Rodney quizzing John and alternately lamenting and salivating over his completely lazy math skills; John sketching jet fighters and spaceships and race cars and dogs – and they’d never had to sit there with nothing but silence between them, relying on a conversation sally that neither one of them were particularly good at.  
  
And then John flashed him a half-smile, leaned forward, whispered conspiratorially, “I’m pretty sure our waiter is a robot,” and suddenly everything was familiar again.  
  
*  
  
Cosmically, Rodney figured, someone really, really hated him, because his cell rang the second they stepped out of the restaurant.  
  
“Doc,” Daisy said as soon as he answered, “I’m so sorry, but George is, like, hysterical, and I can’t calm him down.”  
  
“What happened?” Rodney asked shortly, visions of bloody hands, cracked skulls, serial killers hiding in closets spinning through his mind. He could hear hiccupping sobs in the background, and he clutched his cell in a tight, white-knuckled grip.  
  
“Everything okay?” John leaned over to murmur, and Rodney waved him off.  
  
“I don’t know what’s wrong,” Daisy said. She sounded strung out and distressed.  
  
“All right, fine, hold on and I’ll be right there.” Rodney thumbed off the cell and rubbed a hand over his face. “Sorry,” he said.  
  
“Hey, no. It’s fine.” John slid his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “Come on, let’s get you home.”  
  
“Right, right,” Rodney said, and he was quiet the whole ride, jaw tight, because this was George. George who’d lost his parents and he should have known this whole date was a bad idea. George had a _schedule_ , and he’d broken it just because he’d wanted to get into John’s pants, and there was no doubt in Rodney’s mind that this was his fault. He should have been home hours ago.  
  
He swung into his driveway and was out of the car before John had a chance to scrabble for his seatbelt, and when he burst through the front door, there was a blur of George, practically throwing himself at Rodney’s legs.  
  
“Hey,” Rodney said, trying for his best soothing tone, which wasn’t really very soothing, but George seemed to calm just from the sound of his voice. Rodney picked him up, wrapping his arms around him, hugging him to his chest, and George hiccupped wetly against his neck, fingers in a tight grip on his shirt. “You’re okay.”  
  
“He. He just started, and he wouldn’t stop and Ronon’s not home and I didn’t know what to—”  
  
“Don’t be stupid,” Rodney cut her off, rolling his eyes. “I shouldn’t have left him so long, it’s fine. How’s Tiffany?”  
  
“Tiff’s fine.” Daisy nodded, and it looked a little like she’d been crying, too, her dark eyes rimmed in red. “Sound asleep.”  
  
“Everything good?”  
  
Rodney turned, and John was standing in the still-open doorway, hands on his hips. “Yes, um. Everything’s under control.”  
  
John grinned. He stepped inside and peeked around at George’s face, half mashed into Rodney’s shoulder. “Hey there, big guy,” he said, soft, and George sniffled and lifted his head up, face damp and snotty, still clutching Rodney in a somewhat desperate grip.  
  
“Wanna say hi, G?” Daisy asked, smiling. She still looked a little strung out and upset, but the smile seemed genuine enough.  
  
George ducked down again. He said, “Hi,” muffled against Rodney’s now _also_ damp and snotty shirt.  
  
“So, I’ll just, uh.” Rodney shifted awkwardly on his feet.  
  
John shook his head, mouth still curved up slightly. “It’s fine, Rodney. C’mon, kid,” he wrapped an arm around Daisy’s shoulders, “let’s go home.”  
  
*  
  
John had no idea what he was doing with Rodney.  
  
In the passenger seat, Daisy sniffed and rubbed her wrist under her nose and asked, “Are you serious?”  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“With the doc. Are you _serious_ , Dad, because he’s got _kids_ ,” Daisy said.  
  
Firstly, John did not need this kind of pressure. His hands tightened on the steering wheel. Secondly, “In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got a kid, too.”  
  
He could practically hear Daisy roll her eyes. “But I’m, like, full grown.”  
  
John’s eye started twitching, and his brain hurt. “You are not full grown,” he said. Daisy would be full grown over his dead and rotting body. Sometimes he had flashes of her future wedding and John was always sobbing quietly in a corner.  
  
Daisy sighed. “Sorry you couldn’t finish your date,” she said, slumping a little into his side.  
  
It wasn’t that late, but John knew a crying baby could take a lot out of you. “Not your fault.” He nudged her with his elbow. “Wanna go get ice cream?”  
  
She hooked her arm through his. “Ice cream would rock.”  
  
*  
  
John was so busy with work and planning Daisy’s birthday party and dodging weirdly frequent calls from Elizabeth that he didn’t notice Rodney was avoiding him for nearly a week.  
  
It was an easy out, and John surprised himself a little by not wanting to take it.  
  
“You’re avoiding me,” John said, slipping into the seat across from Rodney.  
  
“I am not,” Rodney said without looking up. He had a notebook spread open, completely covered in near-indecipherable scratches, but John spotted a folded up copy of the _Daily Times_ – Rodney had this love-hate relationship with the crossword puzzles. He complained about them being ridiculously simple, but he never missed completing one.  
  
John grinned. “Are, too.”  
  
Rodney gave him a pissy look, mouth tight and annoyed.  
  
John wanted to kiss him until the lines bracketing it relaxed, and he freaked out inside for a split-second before resolutely shaking it off. He _liked_ Rodney. Daisy liked Rodney. Rodney avoiding him had effectively killed whatever reserve John had felt before. Relationships were tough, and John would rather stab himself in the thigh than have some sort of conversation with Rodney about _feelings_ , but he wasn’t going to let Rodney cut him off. Rodney had two kids, but Daisy had been worth it, worth everything, so he couldn’t think of any reason why this would be any different.  
  
John was thinking about this as something permanent, and, okay, so maybe a cold sweat broke out all over his whole body, and maybe he wasn’t ready for anything heavy-duty now, hell, they hadn’t even slept together yet, but he also couldn’t imagine his life _without_ Rodney. So it was really just a long stretch of _someday, eventually_ , and he couldn’t help but look forward to it.  
  
“I’m not avoiding you,” Rodney said, stubborn tilt to his chin.  
  
John slumped down in the vinyl booth, grin widening. “Sure. So you’ll be at Daisy’s party.”  
  
“Of course,” Rodney said, and John kind of loved him for the sudden bewildered look on his face, like it hadn’t even occurred to Rodney that avoiding John – which he _so_ had been doing – would involve skipping out on Daisy’s birthday. “The Death Machine might even been finished.”  
  
John winced. “I wish you wouldn’t call it that.”  
  
Rodney waved a hand. “Don’t worry, it’ll be perfectly safe.” He frowned. “I’d advise stocking up on road flares, though, and a tire pump kit and—I’ve got a list, I’ll take her to AutoZone tomorrow. I’m pretty sure I have an extra reflective jacket.”  
  
“Rodney—”  
  
“I’ve already given her the Other Drivers Are Morons speech,” Rodney said, gripping his coffee cup between tight fingers. “Do you think we can convince her to wear a helmet?”  
  
John arched an eyebrow.  
  
“What?” Rodney asked, wide-eyed.  
  
John shook his head. “Nothing.”  
  
*  
  
John heard the front screen door creak open and shut, the subsequent stomps up the stairs, and he stared up at the ceiling, wincing as a bedroom door slammed. Okay. He checked the clock over the stove. It was barely seven, and Daisy should’ve still been over at Rodney’s, and while temper tantrums weren’t exactly a strange occurrence for her, she hadn’t been in a _mood_ since starting work on the car.  
  
Sighing, John got up from the counter and made his way upstairs.  
  
He knocked softly on her door. “Daize?”  
  
“Go away.”  
  
John groaned. He really, really hated it when she got like this. “Not gonna happen,” he said.  
  
“Go. Away,” Daisy said again, voice louder, like she was standing directly on the other side of the door, talking into the wood.  
  
“See, that’s not a very convincing argument. You should’ve gone for ‘I’m okay,’ and then low-balled me with some girl problems.” John heard her sigh, but the door remained firmly closed. He turned and slid down to sit on the floor, then rapped the thin wood over his shoulder with his knuckles.  
  
She knocked back, right by his head.  
  
Daisy was his baby girl, and he hated to see her hurting. He moved, pressed his ear up against the door. “What happened?” he asked.  
  
“Nothing. I’m.” She paused, John waited. The best thing to do with her, with him, with any Sheppard, really, was to wait. “Mom called me. She’s not coming.”  
  
John cursed under his breath. Daisy put up a strong front, John knew that. It didn’t matter that Daisy had told her not to come; parents were supposed to do the exact opposite of what their kids wanted them to do. John was pretty sure that was in a rule book somewhere.  
  
Sorry wasn’t going to cut it, and like hell was John going to make any excuses for Elizabeth. Right now, she’d disappointed the most important person in John’s life.  
  
“Rampant goat disease?” John said.  
  
There was a choked off, watery laugh, and then the doorknob turned, and John shifted his weight just in time to avoid falling backwards into Daisy’s room.  
  
“Hey,” he said, and Daisy, curled up on her knees, flung herself into John’s arms, and John held on tight and let her pretend she wasn’t crying.  
  
*  
  
Rodney would deny it until he died, but he maybe cried a little the morning George woke up and said, “Uncle Rodney.” It was barely crying. A slight welling of tears around his eyes, his cheeks weren’t even wet.  
  
And then George wouldn’t stop saying ‘Uncle Rodney,’ wouldn’t stop _talking_ , and Rodney realized George had come into his McKay heritage. He felt more sympathy for his parents than he ever had before. George had a running commentary for everything, and Rodney only understood half of what was coming out of his mouth, but his nephew was clearly a genius.  
  
“He said thermonuclear the other day. Or maybe it was pancakes, but either way, _genius_ ,” Rodney said smugly.  
  
Daisy rolled her eyes. “He calls Walter ‘doggy.’”  
  
“You’ve misunderstood him,” Rodney said. Either that, or George was merely pointing out how dog-like Walter could be, because that kind of sound reasoning was not beyond a toddler McKay.  
  
“He eats bugs.”  
  
Rodney ignored her and blew a raspberry on Tiffany’s stomach before snapping up her onesy.  
  
“He wears a colander on his head and runs into walls,” Daisy said.  
  
Rodney huffed irritably, hefting Tiffany into his arms. She fisted a hand in his shirt collar and gurgled, and Rodney resigned himself to having drool all over him for the rest of the day. “Do you want your birthday present or not?”  
  
Daisy perked up. “Yes, please.”  
  
“It’s, uh.” Rodney fidgeted, suddenly nervous. “It’s not much.”  
  
“Whatever, Doc. You already gave me a car,” she said.  
  
“I didn’t give it to you. Your dad’ll be paying out the ass for that thing for years to come.” Rodney would not guarantee that it wouldn’t fall apart the first time Daisy drove it. It ate money faster than it ate gas.  
  
Rodney nudged his closet door open wider with his foot and pointed towards a battered box. “That first.”  
  
Daisy dropped to her knees and slid it out, tugging open the flaps. It really wasn’t much. He’d found a bunch of Jeannie’s old albums – The Clash, Joy Division, Michael Jackson, Rush, Yes, David Bowie, The Velvet Underground.  
  
“They were my sister’s,” he said awkwardly when Daisy didn’t say anything at all, just made a noise in the back of her throat and started flipping through the records. “Figured maybe you’d like the same weird stuff.”  
  
“Pink Floyd,” Daisy finally said, and Rodney couldn’t identify the strange tone of her voice. “The Ramones. _Sex Pistols_?”  
  
Rodney grimaced. “Please tell me you’re not completely oblivious to punk rock. You’ll make me feel even older than I actually am.”  
  
Daisy tipped her head back and looked up at him with huge, stunned eyes. “This is _awesome_.”  
  
“Oh. Well.” Rodney felt his face heat. “If you dig deeper in the closet there’s a record player, too.”  
  
Jumping to her feet, Daisy slung her arms around both Tiffany and Rodney, and Rodney held himself stiffly and blushed even more and huffed and said, “Yes, yes, you’re welcome, now get this junk out of here so George can make yet another brilliant but unnecessary fort.” George had been slowing and steadily taking over every nook and cranny of Rodney’s house with blankets and pillows and boxes of fruit roll-ups, but Rodney honestly didn’t care.  
  
“You’re the best, Doc,” Daisy said. “Thank you.”  
  
*  
  
Daisy’s party was small, and mostly consisted of adults and Nicky Jackson. This didn’t actually make Rodney feel any more comfortable. He let George follow Dex around and kept Tiffany to himself, hoping her general adorableness would distract everyone from seeing the panic Rodney was sure was showing in his eyes. He’d never been very good at pretending everything was fine.  
  
John looked good. John always looked good, it was one of the reasons Rodney was having trouble staying away from him. The other reasons had to do with his donkey laugh and his skinny legs and his addiction to ice cream and really bad sci-fi movies.  
  
He had to remind himself constantly that George and Tiffany _needed_ him.  
  
John flopped down on the couch beside him and said, “Hey, McKay,” and Rodney leaned into him a little before jerking back. John frowned. “Okay.”  
  
“No, I. This isn’t working,” Rodney said, and he _had not_ meant to say that, at least not right then. He hugged Tiffany’s back up against his chest, and she squirmed a little in protest.  
  
“Okay,” John said again, drawing the word out. “So you’re dumping me at my daughter’s birthday dinner?”  
  
“Not, um.” Dumping sounded so harsh. And it also made Rodney’s mouth dry up, and he felt nauseous and a little dizzy and he wanted desperately to grab John’s hand and never let go. “Not really?”  
  
John pursed his lips. His eyes were dark, darker than usual, and Rodney focused on the crows-feet, the lived-in skin, and thought maybe they were too old for this shit.  
  
Rodney shook his head. “Never mind.”  
  
“You don’t—”  
  
“I’m freaking out. I mean, George was freaking out, and I’m not very good at this.” He waved his hand around. “Any of this. You, me.” He meant more than that – that he had no idea what he was doing with George or Tiffany or Walter or _anyone_ \- and with the way John’s face softened, he thought maybe John got that.  
  
“You’re good, Rodney,” John said. “I’m not headed anywhere I don’t want to go.”  
  
*  
  
John was a dad, first and foremost. He’d done more than watch Daisy get this far, he’d _raised her_. She was her own person, yeah, but John helped shape her; would continue to help shape her for the rest of his life.  
  
Rodney was a dad – thrust even more unexpectedly into the role than most, along with more problems. But he was definitely a dad, and John got that George and Tiffany were going to be first for Rodney in all things. He understood, and he was patient, and John would do anything he could to help.  
  
If that meant backing down, it meant backing down. If that meant playing Candy Land with a talkative three-year-old while Rodney snored like a chainsaw on his living room couch, he’d totally take it. George lasted a half hour before tanking out himself.  
  
Daisy yawned around a Blow Pop and shifted Tiffany higher on her lap. “Best party ever,” she said. She leaned her head against the back of John’s shoulder. “Thanks for inviting Nick.”  
  
“And for the car,” John said, packing up the board game. George was sprawled out on his back, fingers curled tight around the green game piece.  
  
“And for the car,” she obediently echoed. “And for the clothes and the skateboard and the cake. Did I show you what Doc McKay gave me?”  
  
John nodded, then shifted so he could settle back against the couch, curling an arm around Daisy’s shoulders.  
  
“Think we can find, like, a music store that sells records?” she asked.  
  
“We could try,” he said. He pressed a kiss to her temple. “Good birthday?”  
  
“Yeah,” she said, soft.  
  
*  
  
“There is something wrong with you,” Radek said. “I do not like it.”  
  
Rodney harrumphed. “You don’t have kids.”  
  
Radek pushed his glasses up his nose and glared at him. “I have a spoiled lap dog and an anxiety-ridden robot who has now taken to screaming at closed doors. I do not need children.”   
  
“I _mean_ ,” Rodney said, “you won’t be useful in helping me solve my current problem.” On the phone last night, Carson had told him that kids were resilient, that he hadn’t been neglecting them, that they’re doing better than fine, couldn’t he see that? But Carson had also thought George had needed _therapy_ , and when it comes right down to it, Carson’s just a voodoo practitioner from the boonies of Scotland, so what would he really _know_?  
  
Kids cried, Carson had said. Sometimes for no reason at all, or for some reason you couldn’t see, and you couldn’t keep them happy twenty four hours out of the day, but Rodney was damn well going to _try_.  
  
Radek frowned at him. “You are going to mess up things with John, yes? And then you are going to be miserable, and you are going to make me miserable, which in turn will make Kavanagh miserable, which I am not against on principal, but there will be more yelling than I would like, and then we will get nothing done here for weeks.” He frowned harder, and poked Rodney in the chest with a finger. “You will think about this carefully, Rodney, or I may be forced to involve Cadman.”  
  
Rodney gaped at him. “You wouldn’t.”  
  
“I would,” Radek said solemnly.   
  
Rodney stared Radek down. Radek didn’t even flinch, though, and Rodney would do anything to keep Cadman from meddling - even more than usual - in his life. She was a minion of the devil who made possibly the best macaroni and cheese Rodney had ever tasted. She knew how to get Rodney to do things he didn’t want to do. It was baffling, considering Cadman was a trigger-happy hick townie. It might be the blonde hair.  
  
“You,” Rodney said. “You’ll regret this.” Radek would regret this in the form of enforced bonding with Kavanagh over the new, utterly wrong, wrong, wrong calculations sent down from the institute.  
  
Radek gave him a knowing, sly grin and said, “Not as much as you would have.”  
  
*  
  
Daisy rolled onto her back on the bed and held Tiffany above her. Tiffany giggled and waved her hands towards her, little hands clenched into fists. “You’re being stupid,” she said.  
  
Rodney said, “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that,” and continued folding tiny little socks and pants and shirts and bibs and thought about how big Tiffany was getting, and how George needed new shoes.  
  
“My dad _likes_ you. He thinks you’re awesome,” Daisy said. She settled Tiffany down on her chest and looked over at him. “ _I_ think you’re awesome, and my opinion pretty much counts for everything.”  
  
Rodney had never been called awesome before. He knew, of course, that he was amazing and a genius and more important than a whopping four-fifths of the entire population of earth, but it was different to hear something like that out-loud. He thought he should probably feel vindicated, but really he just felt, uh, loved. His face was hot, and there was a lump in his throat, and he chalked it all up to sleep-deprivation - Tiffany had kept him up half the night before with a slight fever and a cranky mouth.  
  
“Okay,” he said, and Daisy beamed at him, and Rodney didn’t want to get his hopes up or anything, but everything seemed a little lighter than it had in weeks.  
  
*  
  
“I don’t like you,” John said, hands on his hips.  
  
“Understood, sir,” Nick said, but he was smiling, the punk.  
  
John really did not like Nick Jackson. Nick Jackson came off perfect in his pressed khakis and powder blue polo and something about him grated the hell out of John. And he _hated_ that he was taking out Daisy. John would follow them in his own car if Daisy hadn’t made him promise he wouldn’t. Luckily, she hadn’t said anything about Ford.  
  
“Daddy,” Daisy said, practically jumping down the stairs, “quit harassing Nicky, geez.”  
  
John tugged on her pony-tail as she skipped past. “Ten o’clock.”  
  
“Midnight,” Daisy countered.  
  
“Ten thirty.”  
  
“Eleven.”  
  
John raised his eyebrows. He thought for sure it’d take longer to get there. “Deal,” he said, and they shook on it, because sometimes Daisy was as much of a dork as him.  
  
John quickly assessed her outfit, deemed it okay - it covered all her important parts, at least, he’d never understand all the safety pins - and then grinned what he hoped was an appropriately threatening grin at Nick before saying, “You kids have fun.”  
  
He felt gratified seeing Nick’s eyes widen just the tiniest bit.  
  
He watched them leave, watched Nick back his shiny black BMW out of John’s driveway - John really, really, really didn’t like that boy - and then he closed the front door and slumped back against it and ignored the annoying prickling of his eyes, because John Sheppard did not cry, especially not about his daughter going out on her first date - and if it wasn’t her first, John didn’t want to know about it.  
  
John still hadn’t gotten himself completely together when his doorbell rang ten minutes later.  
  
Rodney was there, shifting restlessly on the balls of his feet and refusing to look at him.  
  
“Hey,” John said. He curled a hand around his doorjamb and tried not to think about how Rodney looked - like this was one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do. Something tightened in John’s chest.  
  
“I want you to realize what you’d be getting into,” Rodney said, cheeks red, staring at John’s front stoop.   
  
“All right,” John said, slow.  
  
“You’ve already done this once, and sometimes I have no idea what I’m doing, and I’m not going to force you into, into,” he waved a hand, “this with me, but you need to know that—that it’s all or nothing. All three of us, or none of us.”  
  
And that. That was kind of easy to decide. John almost smiled, and he rubbed a shaky hand across his forehead. “Rodney,” John said, and waited until Rodney looked up at him, mouth tight, eyes wary. “I get it, Rodney. I told you before.” He’d figured Rodney already knew this, but John was crap at talking about feelings with anybody except Daisy, and even then they mostly ate ice cream and talked with their eyebrows. John shrugged. “I’m always going to be a dad, too.”  
  
Rodney’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “Um.”  
  
John could tell Rodney he didn’t want to do it again, all the hard parts between then and now, the sicknesses, injuries, tears, joys, hugs - he could, but it would probably be a lie. Fatherhood was the hardest adventure he’d ever embarked on, and he kind of loved everything about it. Even letting go.  
  
“Come on,” John said, curling a hand over Rodney’s arm and tugging him further inside. “I’ve got a police scanner in the kitchen and Ford’s on Nick’s tail. Wanna have popcorn and spy on my daughter?”  
  
Rodney grinned up at him and bounced on his toes. “I’m thinking about implanting Tiffany with a GPS chip.”  
  
“I don’t think that’s legal,” John said, steering him through the doorway.  
  
Rodney twisted around and jabbed a finger at him. “I can make one for Daisy, too.”  
  
John rolled his lips in over his teeth to cover a grin, then shook his head and said, “We’ll talk.”  
  
*  
  
The house was quiet, both kids napping. The rare peace was unsettling, and left Rodney with too many thoughts.  
  
In recent years, Jeannie and Rodney hadn’t been very close. The paths of their lives diverged drastically, and neither of them, as far as Rodney knew, had ever blamed each other for losing touch. So Rodney missed Jeannie, but it was an abstract grief. It made him nostalgic. It made him think of all the screaming fights they’d had over Jeannie essentially ruining her life, wasting her incredible, possibly even more brilliant than his brain and having _babies_ and _a husband_ and _giving up_.   
  
Rodney would never ever, even now that Jeannie was gone, admit that he’d been wrong – family had never been the McKay’s strong suit – but he could understand her a little better now. It was just another legacy, albeit one that didn’t come with a Nobel Prize - and had the side effect of slowly eroding his fine motor skills. Rodney was banking on them taking care of him in his old age.  
  
Rodney sat on the kitchen floor, back propped up against the refrigerator. It was uncomfortable, and Rodney’s ass was going numb and it was only a matter of time before there’d be shooting pain up his legs, but he couldn’t concentrate anywhere else – was having trouble concentrating at all; the silence was _eerie_.   
  
Walter ignored Rodney’s tasty papers stacked up on the floor and dug at one of his pant-legs with frantic paws; he tugged on the material with his teeth, ears back. He bumped Rodney’s hand when he reached down to pet him, nipping his pinkie and pushing it away with his nose before going back to whatever the hell he was doing to the hem of Rodney’s pants.  
  
“I was destined for greatness, you know,” Rodney told Walter.  
  
Walter looked unimpressed.  
  
And then Rodney heard the familiar thumps of George slowly making his way down the stairs, armed with his sneakers - Rodney could picture the colander on his head, blankies wrapped around his neck like a scarf - and for a second he thought about the calculations he needed to get done before the next day. But he just levered himself to his feet, groaning at the pop of his knees, and started on a late lunch.  
  
George’s smile materialized around the doorjamb, along with his sticky fingers and smudged cheeks, and Dex had obviously let him play in the dirt again - Rodney was going to have to have a talk with him about baths; Rodney suspected Dex was feeding his kid giant lies about tubs and sea monsters, given the way George cried like all his skin was going to get eaten off whenever Rodney got him near water.  
  
Rodney made a mental note to plan a trip to the beach and teach George all about the wonder of whales.  
  
“What do you think, George, peanut butter and jelly?”  
  
George said, “Okay,” and dropped down to his knees to play with Walter – and babbled on about a red dog he saw with Dex that had big ears and no tail, and Rodney was absolutely _not_ getting George a dog; dogs and Rodney did not get along, they sensed his immense disdain and always tried to bite him - and Rodney’s heart didn’t swell or skip a beat or anything incredibly trite or stupid like that. Really.  
  
Rodney didn’t believe in heaven or ghosts or the afterlife or reincarnation – he didn’t, but some days he really felt like he _should_ , just so he could look forward to giving Jeannie several pieces of his precious, precious mind; what had she been _thinking_ , doing this to him?  
  
And some days he felt like he should, just so he could thank her.


End file.
